After working with Unity for a little while longer, my opinion has begun to sour, if just by a little bit. I often find myself unable to move forward with certain assignments purely due to the sheer amount of time I spend tackling issues over the smallest detail. This issue mainly occurs with code, and like always when it comes to programming for me, following the tutorials exactly as shown still does not work. I find this issue to be far more prominent with 3D templates as a whole, 2D on the other hand has proven to be far nicer to me, which is why I'm more drawn to Unity for it's 2D aspects. I also as a whole find the 2D templates to be far more appealing due to the flexibility for hand-drawn and other visual aspects, which are difficult to run in a 3D setting. Some of my favorite 2D games are the types that make use of a distinct artstyle, whether it be pixel, paint or any other method the developers can come up with. And I feel it's this potential that's helping me hold on to the engine as a whole rather than abandon it out of frustration. My comments on these issues may be brief, but they're far more important than they seem, as it could affect my faith in the engine as a whole, and I really do hope it doesn't come to that point. I enjoy the aspect of giving different types of are a more concrete form through the engine, and I seriously don't want technical issues to be the end of it
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As is a common trend throughout this entire year, I've had to make a ton of plans to make sure I don't get swamped by everything on my to-do list at once. But outside of this work calendar is a rough plan of various things to do on my own, like hobbies or ways to improve my art. Part of this plan is to eventually pick up animation, which is something that has been on the list for a very long time. I've always been fascinated by animation as a whole, but have never found time to engage in it's very long learning process. Refining my art in a number of ways has always been a focus of mine, and has also been a bit hard to maintain due to school. I do hope that spring break is the time I've needed to get into these topics, and begin teaching myself how to animate, because I've put it off for far too long. School has really been pressing me for time these past few months, all the while I have a number of personal responsibilities continuing to grow, which leaves me very little time to do my own things, and pursue the hobbies I started at the beginning of the year. The end of the school year is also rapidly approaching, meaning that both my senior year and the inevitable aspect of college are rapidly approaching. So my time to develop meaningful skills before I start higher education is all the more important. Developing these skills is extremely important to me, because it could contribute to whatever it is I ultimately decide to do in the future. And being unprepared is the last thing I want to happen.
Well it finally happened, we got around to the Unity game engine. This was something I had been anticipating for quite some time now, and was impressed in a number of ways, but also left a bit confused in others. As a whole, the engine has a ridiculous number of features, meaning almost every aspect, every mechanic that may be created in a game, is taken into account here. Coding, check, 3D modeling, check, 2D animation, the list goes on and on. It very easy to get lost in this vast expanse of stuff, which can make it a bit overwhelming at times. But can prove to be worth it in the end As a whole, I found it easy to manage elements and their parameters in the inspector window, as everything is laid out quite simply. It's not difficult to find out what does what, and to apply some interesting features to the props. On the other hand, there were a few things that did not make a lot of sense, like asset management. Taking assets from an external source to import into the engine can be a unnecessarily complex, as downloading the assets doesn't work half the time, sometimes they aren't compatible with the scenes, and other times they don't interact well with the parameters set on them. That being said, coding also presented a few issues for me, just simply by not working. I personally don't pay that too much attention, as anything involving movement or animation in the past has had a history of just not working, for no reason at all. All in all, the Unity assignments gave me serious headaches, drained me of all energy, and occasionally turned my computer into a nuclear warhead. But, they still hold enormous potential, and have presented a good number of interesting mechanics to me, especially the 2D modes. I still look forward to using this in the future, as a good number of my favorite games have come out of this, and I am aware of the capabilities it has. I'm not going to immediately forget about it, no matter how much pain the tutorials bring me.
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AuthorI have a passion for creating things, and hopefully one day those things will be video games. You can check over on this blog if you wish to see any updates on my work or other subjects. The views and opinions expressed in this blog are solely those of the author and do not represent those of Durham School of the Arts or Durham Public Schools.
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